Danny O'Brien has been at 1 events

We invite you to join us for a live Google Hangout on Tuesday October 1st at 2 PM Pacific / 5 PM Eastern to learn more about the TPP's copyright provisions and their impact on users, their effect on U.S. copyright law, and how we can work together to protect our access to knowledge, digital rights, and internet freedom. There will also be time for Q & A.
Even though we successfully killed SOPA and ACTA, special interests groups continue to pour millions of lobbying dollars to push policies that would further restrict our rights to knowledge. Unable to pass such measures through our legislative process, they’re using secretive, non-democratic tactics to fold harsher copyright restrictions and enforcement measures into a larger trade agreement. The latest and biggest threat on this front is the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a multinational trade agreement being negotiated between the United States and 11 other Asia-Pacific countries.
Speakers:
* Lori Wallach: Director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch
* Krista Cox, Staff attorney at Knowledge Ecology International (KEI)
* Maira Sutton, Global Policy Analyst at EFF
* Parker Higgins, Activist at EFF

TPP, Copyright, and Users' Rights: Google Hangout with EFF, KEI, and Public Citizen

Most comments: 7

Most reshares: 14

This footnote to a one page memo on SOPA I was writing grew into an entire page of its own. It seemed a waste to discard it completely.

The widespread discontent over SOPA, particularly when couched in terms of freedom of expression, can be hard to understand by those most directly affected by it. Among the explanations that I have heard is that this reaction is led by and stoked by companies like Google who “profit from piracy”; that it is primarily only felt by those who use piracy websites; and that it is a childish attempt to evade any regulation whatsoever online, and preserve the Internet as a “Wild West” with no rules whatsoever.

I think these characterizations reflect a misunderstanding of the motives of those opposing the bill.

This whole debate is sticky with earthy metaphors to describe complex technical points, but let me try with just one more analogy: this ti... more »

Most plusones: 19

Woah, I just found out that +Anas Maarawi the Syrian tech blogger, has been released from jail after he +1'd a post I made about him and started following me. He was one of the first to join Google+, and I wondered at the time whether he was the first to be arrested for online freedom of speech.

Sad how this comes just after Eric Schmidt, in answering a question about G+'s real names policy, had apparently implied that Syrians and Iranians who are at risk simply shouldn't use Google+. Of course, Anas is one of the biggest names in the Arab Android community too, as the host of http://ardroid.com/ .

Also, today, I note that an (apparently) Iranian Google Chrome user warned Google that someone had obtained fake Google.com certificates, and was using them to break Google's secure connections in Iran. That's a major security issue for Google users worldwide -- and it... more »

The draft UN resolution on digital privacy initiated by Brazil and Germany emerged on November 20 relatively undamaged, despite efforts by the United States and other members of the "Five Eyes" group to weaken its language. https://eff.org/r.qh6b -- we've joined with other human rights groups to explain why its wording is so important.﻿

The draft UN resolution on digital privacy initiated by Brazil and Germany emerged on November 20 relatively undamaged, despite efforts by the United States and other members of the "Five Eyes" group to weaken its language. https://eff.org/r.qh6b -- we've joined with other human rights groups to explain why its wording is so important.﻿___

Hackerspaces all over the Americas are meeting online to work on strategy to defeat the Intellectual Property provisions of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP). See: https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Hack%2BRemix_Party_against_TPP﻿

Hackerspaces all over the Americas are meeting online to work on strategy to defeat the Intellectual Property provisions of the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP). See: https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Hack%2BRemix_Party_against_TPP﻿___

Alright clever, clever people who are up in the middle of the night. Who would like to join me, and LEE FREAKING FELSENSTEIN for a night of wonder and excitement at the next #5mof Five Minutes of Fame?

8PM, TUESDAY 21ST, email me at danny@spesh.com or here in the comments if you would like to show off a new project, handwave your new idea, explain the unexplicable, or just lose yourself in a 300 second rant.﻿

Alright clever, clever people who are up in the middle of the night. Who would like to join me, and LEE FREAKING FELSENSTEIN for a night of wonder and excitement at the next #5mof Five Minutes of Fame?

8PM, TUESDAY 21ST, email me at danny@spesh.com or here in the comments if you would like to show off a new project, handwave your new idea, explain the unexplicable, or just lose yourself in a 300 second rant.﻿___

Here's a link to the "Five Minutes of Fame" preso I did on QuickMuni last week at Noisebridge. Yeah it's actually more like ten to fifteen minutes long, but you get the idea. Thanks, +Danny O'Brien! Enjoy. :-)﻿

Here's a link to the "Five Minutes of Fame" preso I did on QuickMuni last week at Noisebridge. Yeah it's actually more like ten to fifteen minutes long, but you get the idea. Thanks, +Danny O'Brien! Enjoy. :-)﻿___

Walkthrough of Noisebridge at 10.30pm in the middle of the #aaronsw memorial hackathon. Dozens of people working on open data projects. I gave a lecture on the history of free culture, the semantic Web, and Aaron's politics. Hackathon continues until late Sunday. You should come by.﻿

Walkthrough of Noisebridge at 10.30pm in the middle of the #aaronsw memorial hackathon. Dozens of people working on open data projects. I gave a lecture on the history of free culture, the semantic Web, and Aaron's politics. Hackathon continues until late Sunday. You should come by.﻿___

I haven't bothered to mention the whole sad Aaron Swartz saga, because it's been covered elsewhere.

But having the involved US attorney then basically lie about it all in a very public statement is something that I find particularly offensive. Compare these two statements - one from July 2011, one from yesterday, and tell me Carmen Ortiz isn't lying..

Yesterday (as reported by the Wall Street Journal and elsewhere):

"At no time did this office ever seek – or ever tell Mr. Swartz’s attorneys that it intended to seek – maximum penalties under the law."

And July 2011 (as posted by justice.gov itself):

"SWARTZ faces up to 35 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, restitution, forfeiture and a fine of up to $1 million"

I haven't bothered to mention the whole sad Aaron Swartz saga, because it's been covered elsewhere.

But having the involved US attorney then basically lie about it all in a very public statement is something that I find particularly offensive. Compare these two statements - one from July 2011, one from yesterday, and tell me Carmen Ortiz isn't lying..

Yesterday (as reported by the Wall Street Journal and elsewhere):

"At no time did this office ever seek – or ever tell Mr. Swartz’s attorneys that it intended to seek – maximum penalties under the law."

And July 2011 (as posted by justice.gov itself):

"SWARTZ faces up to 35 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, restitution, forfeiture and a fine of up to $1 million"

Maybe that official and very public PR thing wasn't "telling Mr. Swartz’s attorneys", right? Because in private, Ms Ortiz was probably talking about how she wanted to pay Aaron for his services, and just hug him. Right? Anybody?

Ms Ortiz, just admit you were an ass-hat, and apologize. Instead of this kind of crap. Weasel-wording and misleading about your actions is not making your office look any better.

Noisebridge's fondant selection of geeks and their projects, plans, rants and recursive recursions are back! Every speaker gets five minutes, every speaker has plans for world domination. This month: a special seasonal look at apocalypses, galactic empires, DIY X-ray photography, and wool. Free! Even freer if you bring a friend!﻿

Noisebridge's fondant selection of geeks and their projects, plans, rants and recursive recursions are back! Every speaker gets five minutes, every speaker has plans for world domination. This month: a special seasonal look at apocalypses, galactic empires, DIY X-ray photography, and wool. Free! Even freer if you bring a friend!﻿___

I don't really use Quora, but it occasionally sends me emails with the subject line of some question or another that it thinks I might be interested in. Usually it's something about Apple, or RIM's survival chances.

Today it was "When living out of your car, where are the best places to park to avoid being noticed...?"

Is Quora trying to tell me something about me, or it?﻿

I don't really use Quora, but it occasionally sends me emails with the subject line of some question or another that it thinks I might be interested in. Usually it's something about Apple, or RIM's survival chances.

Today it was "When living out of your car, where are the best places to park to avoid being noticed...?"

Not sure how readable these are, but this was a set of whiteboard notes from News Foo about reporting on distributed organizations, and the pitfalls of doing so. We talked about everything from Occupy to Wikipedia. I remember +Scott Rosenberg asking for these, no matter how incoherent they were. So here they are!﻿

Not sure how readable these are, but this was a set of whiteboard notes from News Foo about reporting on distributed organizations, and the pitfalls of doing so. We talked about everything from Occupy to Wikipedia. I remember +Scott Rosenberg asking for these, no matter how incoherent they were. So here they are!﻿___

The copyright industries have been concerned for some time about the idea of "cyberlockers" -- in other words places in the cloud where you can store your own content. There was language stuck in a side-letter to the South Korean Free Trade Agreement see http://www.ustr.gov/sites/default/files/uploads/agreements/fta/korus/asset_upload_file939_12739.pdf that targetted such sites, which is a strong indicator that getting such sites shut down has been lobbying aim -- free trade agreements are often full of industry lobbied items.

The term also popped up in a letter by Peter Mandelson during the Digital Economy Bill in the UK ( see http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/20/copyright-digital-economy-cyberlockers-rights ) in 2009.

I know that EFF was trying to warn companies like Dropbox that this was a... more »

Just to place the #megaupload arrests in some context.

The copyright industries have been concerned for some time about the idea of "cyberlockers" -- in other words places in the cloud where you can store your own content. There was language stuck in a side-letter to the South Korean Free Trade Agreement see http://www.ustr.gov/sites/default/files/uploads/agreements/fta/korus/asset_upload_file939_12739.pdf that targetted such sites, which is a strong indicator that getting such sites shut down has been lobbying aim -- free trade agreements are often full of industry lobbied items.

The term also popped up in a letter by Peter Mandelson during the Digital Economy Bill in the UK ( see http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/nov/20/copyright-digital-economy-cyberlockers-rights ) in 2009.

I know that EFF was trying to warn companies like Dropbox that this was a emerging concern when I was there; as someone who worked on international issues, I didn't know the extent to which worries about this were playing out within the US.﻿___

Remembering the first day the Internet went dark -- in 1996, when Jerry Yang's Yahoo! led the protests against the United States' Communications Decency Act. The law was signed into law by President Clinton, and struck down four months later by the courts as unconstitutional. I still love the conclusion of the three judges in Philadelphia:

Cutting through the acronyms and argot that littered the hearing testimony, the Internet may fairly be regarded as a never-ending worldwide conversation. The Government may not, through the CDA, interrupt that conversation. As the mostparticipatory form of mass speech yet developed, the Internet deserves the highest protection from governmental intrusion.

True it is that many find some of the speech on the Internet to be offensive, and amid the din of cyberspace many hear discordant voices that they regard as indecent. The absence of... more »

Remembering the first day the Internet went dark -- in 1996, when Jerry Yang's Yahoo! led the protests against the United States' Communications Decency Act. The law was signed into law by President Clinton, and struck down four months later by the courts as unconstitutional. I still love the conclusion of the three judges in Philadelphia:

Cutting through the acronyms and argot that littered the hearing testimony, the Internet may fairly be regarded as a never-ending worldwide conversation. The Government may not, through the CDA, interrupt that conversation. As the mostparticipatory form of mass speech yet developed, the Internet deserves the highest protection from governmental intrusion.

True it is that many find some of the speech on the Internet to be offensive, and amid the din of cyberspace many hear discordant voices that they regard as indecent. The absence of governmental regulation of Internet content has unquestionably produced a kind of chaos, but as one of plaintiffs' experts put it with such resonance at the hearing:

What achieved success was the very chaos that the Internet is. The strength of the Internet is that chaos.

Just as the strength of the Internet is chaos, so the strength of our liberty depends upon the chaos and cacophony of the unfettered speech the First Amendment protects.

For these reasons, I without hesitation hold that the CDA is unconstitutional on its face.

What +Erick Erickson Would Say if He Were a Lefty*or, Why +Fred von Lohmann Was Always Right

The first decade of digital music could have been so different -- and much better -- for everyone. If the music industry had followed a very simple approach that embraced the Internet, they would have had in pure profit far more than what the global music sales revenue is today.

Note that nothing in this plan would have required regulation, though smart regulation might have helped.

Imagine if, in July 2001, the music industry had made this offer to P2P users:Pay $10 bucks a monthShare and download the repertoire represented by us, where “us” means the major record labels, major indie labels, publishers, and whoever else is willing and interested to be part of this organization. At first, it wouldn’t represent everyone (and thus maybe the fee t... more »

What +Erick Erickson Would Say if He Were a Lefty*or, Why +Fred von Lohmann Was Always Right

The first decade of digital music could have been so different -- and much better -- for everyone. If the music industry had followed a very simple approach that embraced the Internet, they would have had in pure profit far more than what the global music sales revenue is today.

Note that nothing in this plan would have required regulation, though smart regulation might have helped.

Imagine if, in July 2001, the music industry had made this offer to P2P users:Pay $10 bucks a monthShare and download the repertoire represented by us, where “us” means the major record labels, major indie labels, publishers, and whoever else is willing and interested to be part of this organization. At first, it wouldn’t represent everyone (and thus maybe the fee to consumer would be cheaper too) but it would be open to everyone.

At first, let’s say just 5% of U.S. Internet users signed up for this. In 2001, that would be ~7 million people (http://www.internetworldstats.com/am/us.htm), so 840 million dollars.

At first, this would have paid relatively puny sums. Remember, thanks to Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears, the record industry of the late 90s was a double digit billion dollar industry, but broadband had barely taken off in the US.

At first, this would also cannibalize existing revenue streams. The core subscribers would be big music fans - people who typically buy dozens of albums a year, but hate paying $18 (undiscounted) per CD, when 50% of the CD is crap. So they would end up spending less per year by switching to this new system, and thus the new business model would be parasitic.

But over time, this would change. By 2003, there were already 60 million Americans who were file sharing (http://www.salon.com/2003/09/12/file_sharing_two/), even while the major record labels were suing people for file sharing.

Imagine a world where they were not suing their fans. Imagine if, then, just half of those signed up for the plan - now we’re talking about 3.6 billion dollars per year.

When you consider that this is nearly pure profit, this is an even more impressive number. The industry at this point was still heavily CD driven, and more than half the cost of a CD went to manufacturing, distribution, and retail -- all things that wouldn’t be needed under this business model. Each $18 CD, when netted out between the successes and flops, only gave the record label about $0.19 of profit.

Artists “received” about $2.09, but in actuality most of that money went to the record label as well. For a typical artist deal, costs were deducted for all recording costs, approx. half of promotion costs, packaging, free promotional copies, distribution in new audio formats, breakage fees,and retailer return. Approximately 500,000 to 1,000,000 CD copies needed to be sold before these costs are covered, and thus as a result, at least 90% of artists receive no royalties from their CD sales.

Nevertheless, let’s add this into the profit figure, and tack on another $0.76 for the music publishers. Thus, given that the industry was making about 11 billion dollars on CDs at the time (http://web.archive.org/web/20050401023420/http://www.riaa.com/news/newsletter/pdf/2003yearEnd.pdf) but were only getting a total of ~17% in profit, the industry’s profit at the time would be around “only” 1.87 billion.

Thus, if, rather than suing their fans, the record industry were to have gotten half of American file sharers to pay $10 a month to file share all they want in 2003, they would have had double the profit than they were currently making.

Now jump ahead in time. As the model became successful and Internet use grew, ISPs would have rushed at the opportunity to bundle this deal into their service package -- along with voice/video/broadband/mobile, “music” would have been added on top. And many other service providers would have rushed at the opportunity innovate in new platforms that would have helped subscribers lawfully share their materials in new, delightful ways. That would have created a virtuous cycle, where more people sharing made the service more valuable and thus driven both music service adoption and broadband adoption.

Today, there are ~85 million people on broadband, and 240 million online in the US alone (http://www.internetworldstats.com/am/us.htm).

If you imagine the music industry merely got the 60 million who were already file sharing in 2003 to subscribe, that would be 7.2 billion dollars in pure profit. And if they got these folks signed up earlier than 2010, then they would have been making that profit, with compound interest adding up over the years. With that sort of scale, they might even drop the price in order to get a broader swath of users -- maybe it would even be $5 per month.

And that’s just from US consumers! Imagine if they rolled this out internationally. And imagine if we also took out of the system all the current social waste on lawyers and lobbyists fighting over who stole from whom.

In other words: the music industry would be flush with cash, and music fans would be better for it.

Instead, the music industry has the news that Rhapsody - the $10/month limited catalog limited use subscription service that music fans like me have had for 6 years - just crossed the 1 million user threshold. In a time when everything is shifting to Web apps, the music industry has given the car keys to Spotify and its downloadable client, likely because Spotify gave them upfront payments in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

That ain’t “progress of sciences and useful arts.” That’s sclerosis, in industrial form.

The major record labels didn’t need new regulation to bring this profitable model into being in 2001. They didn’t need any lawsuits or lawyers. In fact, they just needed those people to get out of the way.

Of course, everyone else would have benefited mightily if some smart regulation had actually supported progress in this area, and the major record labels then could have thanked everyone else later.

[* Note: Erickson wrote a fantastic blogpost about stoping #SOPA (http://www.redstate.com/erick/2011/12/22/stopping-sopa). I think he’s right that there are ought to be bipartisan consensus here. Please correct my math as I’m just the law talking guy.]﻿___

This footnote to a one page memo on SOPA I was writing grew into an entire page of its own. It seemed a waste to discard it completely.

The widespread discontent over SOPA, particularly when couched in terms of freedom of expression, can be hard to understand by those most directly affected by it. Among the explanations that I have heard is that this reaction is led by and stoked by companies like Google who “profit from piracy”; that it is primarily only felt by those who use piracy websites; and that it is a childish attempt to evade any regulation whatsoever online, and preserve the Internet as a “Wild West” with no rules whatsoever.

I think these characterizations reflect a misunderstanding of the motives of those opposing the bill.

This whole debate is sticky with earthy metaphors to describe complex technical points, but let me try with just one more analogy: this ti... more »

This footnote to a one page memo on SOPA I was writing grew into an entire page of its own. It seemed a waste to discard it completely.

The widespread discontent over SOPA, particularly when couched in terms of freedom of expression, can be hard to understand by those most directly affected by it. Among the explanations that I have heard is that this reaction is led by and stoked by companies like Google who “profit from piracy”; that it is primarily only felt by those who use piracy websites; and that it is a childish attempt to evade any regulation whatsoever online, and preserve the Internet as a “Wild West” with no rules whatsoever.

I think these characterizations reflect a misunderstanding of the motives of those opposing the bill.

This whole debate is sticky with earthy metaphors to describe complex technical points, but let me try with just one more analogy: this time to convey not the technology, but the emotional impact of SOPA for those who care about the Internet.

Seeking to remove specific domain names from the global naming system for online infringement feels like proposing a bill to allow the government or corporations to order the location of certain foreign booksellers removed from all US-printed maps, on the accusation of selling pirated materials to Americans.

At first glance, such a Pirates Using Maps Act would appear to be simply a bizarre approach: as a way to combat book piracy, it does not seem to at all practical. How could we possibly erase all knowledge of the location of booksellers by erasing their physical location from maps? What have maps to do with piracy? One is so overcome with the surrealism of the idea that, once you realise the proposal is serious, it takes a while to scrabble for other objections. Soon, though, they come thick and fast. Surely maps need to remain bastions of objectivity? If we start removing booksellers from our maps without normal due process, surely that will chill bookselling, an important service? Do we really want to set a precedent for literally erasing locations out of existence simply to combat book-pirating as a particular industry’s problem? What about people who simply live on a street next to a bookseller? And so on.

Like any metaphor, the mapping from PUMA to SOPA is very imperfect. Internet infringement is clearly more widespread than book infringement. DNS-erasing is a little more efficiently performed than rewriting maps. But I hope it conveys succinctly the emotions of Internet technologists and users, and why they feel that they have stumbled into a painfully nonsensical and depressing battle.

I choose booksellers for domain names, to convey the emotional status of a website for many people. It is a source of information, a place where one reads and discovers the news. The domain system is a locating service, as are maps: not the only one, but certainly the ones you expect to trust as a basic, irrefutable source.

If you support SOPA and cannot understand those who oppose it, except to project malicious intent on them, I hope the metaphor is useful, and transmits the strong link that many feel between such proposed laws and restrictions freedom of expression in general (“This is book censorship!”), and why frequent counter-arguments in favor of the bill (“But innocent booksellers can challenge the request in court, and restore their street to future maps!”) ring hollow to their ears.﻿___

The awesome Open Show ( http://openshow.org/bayarea/ ) are presenting a benefit screening of Restrepo, in memory of renowned conflict photographer and director Tim Hetherington, who was killed in Libya in April 2011. Proceeds go to CPJ. Restrepo is an amazing film, I'm really looking forward to seeing it on the big screen.

The awesome Open Show ( http://openshow.org/bayarea/ ) are presenting a benefit screening of Restrepo, in memory of renowned conflict photographer and director Tim Hetherington, who was killed in Libya in April 2011. Proceeds go to CPJ. Restrepo is an amazing film, I'm really looking forward to seeing it on the big screen.

Earlier this week I attended a remarkable meeting, convened by the Committee to Protect Journalists, to discuss Internet freedom issues from the perspective of the incredibly brave activist-journalists from repressive regimes. They face more than the copyright cartel when they do their jobs. They face torture and death. They humble the rest of us.

They were in California for a series of meetings with some of Silicon Valley's best technical people as well as lawyers who deal with Internet freedom issues. The half-day gathering I attended in San Francisco was off the record, but I learned about things I'll be discussing separately.

Meanwhile, CPJ's +Danny O'Brien, who put the activists' Silicon Valley tour together, has posted his own take on their visit. Take a look.﻿

Earlier this week I attended a remarkable meeting, convened by the Committee to Protect Journalists, to discuss Internet freedom issues from the perspective of the incredibly brave activist-journalists from repressive regimes. They face more than the copyright cartel when they do their jobs. They face torture and death. They humble the rest of us.

They were in California for a series of meetings with some of Silicon Valley's best technical people as well as lawyers who deal with Internet freedom issues. The half-day gathering I attended in San Francisco was off the record, but I learned about things I'll be discussing separately.

Meanwhile, CPJ's +Danny O'Brien, who put the activists' Silicon Valley tour together, has posted his own take on their visit. Take a look.﻿___

I'm just finishing off an amazing few days. The Thiel Foundation helped CPJ fly some of the most cutting-edge bloggers, activists and reporters working in dangerous countries or with vulnerable groups to Silicon Valley. I've been escorting them around the companies and organizations here, including large tech firms, EFF, and (naturally) Noisebridge.

Then, somewhat cruelly, I locked them and the most brilliant local techy people I could cajole into a tiny stuffy room with bad Wi-Fi, and had them tell their stories to each other.

I think everyone we spoke with knew, in theory, that we live in a world where state-level actors and organized criminals have an interest in breaking the Internet: but to speak with the dedicated people who deal with this on a day-to-day, life and death, basis, truly transforms the discussion.

I'm just finishing off an amazing few days. The Thiel Foundation helped CPJ fly some of the most cutting-edge bloggers, activists and reporters working in dangerous countries or with vulnerable groups to Silicon Valley. I've been escorting them around the companies and organizations here, including large tech firms, EFF, and (naturally) Noisebridge.

Then, somewhat cruelly, I locked them and the most brilliant local techy people I could cajole into a tiny stuffy room with bad Wi-Fi, and had them tell their stories to each other.

I think everyone we spoke with knew, in theory, that we live in a world where state-level actors and organized criminals have an interest in breaking the Internet: but to speak with the dedicated people who deal with this on a day-to-day, life and death, basis, truly transforms the discussion.

There is much I'd do differently the next time when I organize something like this, but there was an incredible amount of information passed around, all of which showed that there has to be a next time. What happens in places like Syria and Iran is having a direct effect on infrastructure design here, and vice-versa.

A bunch of the meetings were confidential, and I haven't been klaxoning what we did across the Internets (though I want to think more about how we can do that too; it's a perfect opportunity to raise these sites' visibility), but I'd be happy to answer as many questions as I can in the comments here. What we ended up saying was mostly summarized by Rami:

"People I know lost their lives or were tortured for months as a result of security bugs. I am not saying this to blame you, because they know the risks they are taking and they're brave enough to take risks. If you really can help them here with just a small investment in their security, you may save many people's lives. You may not know about them,because you can't follow everything that is happening online, but it is happening. A tiny bug fix on any platform, it will absolutely save people's lives. It is one of the noblest things you can do."﻿___

For my birthday, I want my friends to remember this. Many of you on these social networks got to know me well after I was nineteen, which is when I started to turn my life around, so you may not know about my, honestly, somewhat thuggish past. But some of you were around then. Those of you I still talk to are, in part, responsible for the turn around in my life. You provided a ladder up out of the path that I had set myself upon (and I believed was my only choice).

During the London riots, I've seen lots of you ask for simple solutions to complex societal problems. "Get the army out and kill them all", "They should be locked up and have the key thrown away", "They're irredeemable scum" are the types of sentiment that I'm paraphrasing that I've seen from many of my friends.

For my birthday, I want my friends to remember this. Many of you on these social networks got to know me well after I was nineteen, which is when I started to turn my life around, so you may not know about my, honestly, somewhat thuggish past. But some of you were around then. Those of you I still talk to are, in part, responsible for the turn around in my life. You provided a ladder up out of the path that I had set myself upon (and I believed was my only choice).

During the London riots, I've seen lots of you ask for simple solutions to complex societal problems. "Get the army out and kill them all", "They should be locked up and have the key thrown away", "They're irredeemable scum" are the types of sentiment that I'm paraphrasing that I've seen from many of my friends.

Don't get me wrong here. There's plenty of punishment that needs to go around and reparations that these rioters need to make. They're unquestionably in the wrong. But don't pretend that there are no real underlying causes. Don't pretend that everyone is irredeemable to society. We need to spend the time after the riots in quiet reflection of how to mend our society so this doesn't happen in the future.

For those of you who knew me as a teenager - you know better than this because you've seen the change in my life. You've seen me become a successful consultant, programmer, event organiser, and now know me as someone who gives as much to the communities he lives in as he can. You played a part in this, more than you know. You can still play these parts in the lives of others, instead of advocating for their disposal.

For those of you who've gotten to know me since - I hope that most of you consider me one of the people you know who are least likely to physically hurt anyone. Know this - as a child, I was thrown out of two schools and a college - in all cases for forms of violent conduct. I never completed any form of formal education. I was exactly the kind of youth who would have been rioting. Despite this (and due to the help of friends and mentors), I eventually turned my life around, and am relatively successful. Please think about this before you irredeemably condemn our youth.﻿___

This is just a fantastic collection -- the choice and ordering of the pictures is so well done. I remember when Alan Taylor left the Boston Globe. He was the single person behind the creation and curation of the Globe's Big Picture feature. I understand why the Globe wanted to keep the Big Picture in-house, but I'm delighted Taylor was able to create his own audience at the Atlantic, in the face of having to effectively compete with the brand he built himself.

This is just a fantastic collection -- the choice and ordering of the pictures is so well done. I remember when Alan Taylor left the Boston Globe. He was the single person behind the creation and curation of the Globe's Big Picture feature. I understand why the Globe wanted to keep the Big Picture in-house, but I'm delighted Taylor was able to create his own audience at the Atlantic, in the face of having to effectively compete with the brand he built himself.

Just when I think that the Diginotar trainwreck could not get more trainwrecky, it jumps another few rails. Reading the ComodoHacker's pastebins at http://pastebin.com/u/ComodoHacker with a sceptical eye...﻿

Just when I think that the Diginotar trainwreck could not get more trainwrecky, it jumps another few rails. Reading the ComodoHacker's pastebins at http://pastebin.com/u/ComodoHacker with a sceptical eye...﻿___

Woah, I just found out that +Anas Maarawi the Syrian tech blogger, has been released from jail after he +1'd a post I made about him and started following me. He was one of the first to join Google+, and I wondered at the time whether he was the first to be arrested for online freedom of speech.

Sad how this comes just after Eric Schmidt, in answering a question about G+'s real names policy, had apparently implied that Syrians and Iranians who are at risk simply shouldn't use Google+. Of course, Anas is one of the biggest names in the Arab Android community too, as the host of http://ardroid.com/ .

Also, today, I note that an (apparently) Iranian Google Chrome user warned Google that someone had obtained fake Google.com certificates, and was using them to break Google's secure connections in Iran. That's a major security issue for Google users worldwide -- and it... more »

Woah, I just found out that +Anas Maarawi the Syrian tech blogger, has been released from jail after he +1'd a post I made about him and started following me. He was one of the first to join Google+, and I wondered at the time whether he was the first to be arrested for online freedom of speech.

Sad how this comes just after Eric Schmidt, in answering a question about G+'s real names policy, had apparently implied that Syrians and Iranians who are at risk simply shouldn't use Google+. Of course, Anas is one of the biggest names in the Arab Android community too, as the host of http://ardroid.com/ .

Also, today, I note that an (apparently) Iranian Google Chrome user warned Google that someone had obtained fake Google.com certificates, and was using them to break Google's secure connections in Iran. That's a major security issue for Google users worldwide -- and it was reported by a pseudonymous Iranian user, Alibo:https://www.google.com/support/forum/p/gmail/thread?tid=2da6158b094b225a&hl=en

I guess sometimes at-risk Iranians and Syrians have their uses for Google, and sometimes they just represent ticklish edge cases that the company would rather not deal with.﻿___

It's not quite up there with the live home birth being streamed from Tennessee right now: http://www.blogher.com/watch-home-birth-live , but I'm going to do another one of my publicly-streamed Irish Times column writing sessions at http://thepub.endofgreatness.com/ for the next hour or so. Watch a live human typing into terminal windows!

I'll also be hanging out at #endofgreatness on irc.freenode.net, though I really have no idea why.﻿

It's not quite up there with the live home birth being streamed from Tennessee right now: http://www.blogher.com/watch-home-birth-live , but I'm going to do another one of my publicly-streamed Irish Times column writing sessions at http://thepub.endofgreatness.com/ for the next hour or so. Watch a live human typing into terminal windows!

I'll also be hanging out at #endofgreatness on irc.freenode.net, though I really have no idea why.﻿___

"Social media is no longer a Western phenomenon. It is rapidly spreading around the world, being deployed for a wide variety of purposes. Technology companies must come to terms with the power of the tools they have created, the many ways in which they are used, and the diversity of their markets. That means bringing “extreme users” into conversations about security and privacy and providing additional layers of protection for people sharing in difficult environments. It means recognizing that security is no longer just a first-world problem."﻿___The rise of the fatal edge case.